Re: Referrer report - what it shows exactly and whyitlists only foreign sites

Re: Referrer report - what it shows exactly and whyitlists only foreign sites

Natalia Lis <natalialis [at] gmail> wrote: >> "People don't usually bookmark graphs, they bookmark the pages that >> the graphs are embedded in. The request for the page itself won't >> have a referrer, but the request for the image will have the page >> itself listed as the referrer." >> >> But this referrer would be our own site, right?

Not if the page that is bookmarked is the page at some other site that has your graphs embedded in it.

>> And there is a way to >> exclude one own's sites from being listed in the referrer report? If >> this is the case, and I assume that it is because I don't see any of >> our sites in the report, then wouldn't the result make sense?

You can use REFREPEXCLUDE to exclude matching referrers from the Referrer and Referring Site Reports.

(Note that REFREPEXCLUDE only excludes entries from the Referrer Reports. REFEXCLUDE will exclude the logfile entries that have matching referrers from the whole analysis process. So REFREPEXCLUDE *.oursite.com/* will just keep the "internal" referrers out of the Referrer Reports. REFEXCLUDE *.oursite.com/* will keep any log entries that have "internal" referrers out of your report altogether).

>> "On the other hand, if you want to be able to tell how much of your >> traffic is due to the graphs, and how much is people actually >> visiting your site directly, excluding the graphs may be useful." >> >> That's what I would like to do. Is there a way to set the report so >> that it only counts referrals to certain pages (so as to be sure >> that no graphs are included)?

If you use REFINCLUDE *.oursite.com/Jul/16/report008.html

(for example) then Analog will ignore all log entries that don't have that referrer.

>> (I'm sorry if it's a basic question, I >> don't set the reports, I just interpret the results, if I want >> changes I will have to speak to IT).

I would strongly recommend getting a copy of even a single logfile on your own computer, and installing Analog and running your own copy of Analog against that sample log file. It's a lot easier to understand the nuances of what each report does when you can very quickly make a small modification to the configuration and then run a new report to see what the differences are. Analog can easily crunch through a million lines of log files in under a minute, so you can very quickly see the difference as you change configuration options.

Thanks again, BTW, the IT department is setting Google analytics and it shows that about 7% of the traffic is coming from referring sites - though Google analytics probably only shows referrals to our pages, not to all files. However, I see that many top referrers are the same that are listed in the Referrer report so it starts making sense. I will look at the logfiles though.

Natalia

On Wed, Jul 16, 2008 at 5:08 PM, Aengus <analog07 [at] eircom> wrote:

> Natalia Lis <natalialis [at] gmail> wrote: > >> "People don't usually bookmark graphs, they bookmark the pages that > >> the graphs are embedded in. The request for the page itself won't > >> have a referrer, but the request for the image will have the page > >> itself listed as the referrer." > >> > >> But this referrer would be our own site, right? > > Not if the page that is bookmarked is the page at some other site that has > your graphs embedded in it. > > >> And there is a way to > >> exclude one own's sites from being listed in the referrer report? If > >> this is the case, and I assume that it is because I don't see any of > >> our sites in the report, then wouldn't the result make sense? > > You can use REFREPEXCLUDE to exclude matching referrers from the Referrer > and Referring Site Reports. > > (Note that REFREPEXCLUDE only excludes entries from the Referrer Reports. > REFEXCLUDE will exclude the logfile entries that have matching referrers > from the whole analysis process. So > REFREPEXCLUDE *.oursite.com/* > will just keep the "internal" referrers out of the Referrer Reports. > REFEXCLUDE *.oursite.com/* > will keep any log entries that have "internal" referrers out of your report > altogether). > > > >> "On the other hand, if you want to be able to tell how much of your > >> traffic is due to the graphs, and how much is people actually > >> visiting your site directly, excluding the graphs may be useful." > >> > >> That's what I would like to do. Is there a way to set the report so > >> that it only counts referrals to certain pages (so as to be sure > >> that no graphs are included)? > > If you use > REFINCLUDE *.oursite.com/Jul/16/report008.html > > (for example) then Analog will ignore all log entries that don't have that > referrer. > > >> (I'm sorry if it's a basic question, I > >> don't set the reports, I just interpret the results, if I want > >> changes I will have to speak to IT). > > I would strongly recommend getting a copy of even a single logfile on your > own computer, and installing Analog and running your own copy of Analog > against that sample log file. It's a lot easier to understand the nuances of > what each report does when you can very quickly make a small modification to > the configuration and then run a new report to see what the differences are. > Analog can easily crunch through a million lines of log files in under a > minute, so you can very quickly see the difference as you change > configuration options. > > Aengus > > +------------------------------------------------------------------------ > | TO UNSUBSCRIBE from this list: > | http://lists.meer.net/mailman/listinfo/analog-help> | > | Analog Documentation: http://analog.cx/docs/Readme.html> | List archives: http://www.analog.cx/docs/mailing.html#listarchives> | Usenet version: news://news.gmane.org/gmane.comp.web.analog.general> +------------------------------------------------------------------------ >